Pushing the Foreign Policy Debate in the Direction of Restraint

The problem is that the Overton window does not move back in a direction of less intervention through nuanced critiques of the most extreme position. Believe me, I wish it did. Instead, it needs to move using the same kind of stridency and demagoguery that pushed it in its original direction. So while I personally wouldn’t agree with categorically ruling out the use of force against Iran no matter what, opponents of preventative war are going to have to make some politically risky declarations if they expect the consensus to start to move in their direction.

Scoblete may be right, but as a matter of intra-Republican politics that might not work. Ron Paul discovered that there was a ceiling for his support in the Republican primaries because he took a radical dissenting position against most consensus views on foreign policy. His campaigns had some success in dragging the intra-Republican debate back in the direction of sanity, but could only take it so far. Whatever else one wants to say about it, Rand Paul’s speech was an attempt to meet most Republicans where they are at the moment in the hopes of moving them in the direction of restraint. There is a significant Republican constituency for a more restrained U.S. foreign policy that is less involved in the affairs of other countries*, but many of them aren’t represented by non-interventionists or hard-liners. In theory, these are the conservatives and libertarians that Sen. Paul was trying to reach on Wednesday. It remains to be seen how many of them were listening. It would be ideal if most Republicans could be persuaded that preventive war is wrong and illegal (which it is), but if they can be persuaded that preventive war against Iran is extremely unwise and imprudent that could be good enough.

* 44% of Republicans in the linked Rasmussen survey agreed that the U.S. is “too involved” in the Middle East.

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13 Responses to Pushing the Foreign Policy Debate in the Direction of Restraint

As I’m noting these posts on the Rand Paul speech, etc, I’m reading an essay on John Foster Dulles, where HW Brands makes the point that Dulles essentially knew that “liberation” of Eastern Europe was a crock, as was “unleashing” Chiang, and essentially agreed with Kennan–whom he fired for excessive public candor on these very points. Quite interesting,to make themselves acceptable to the Republican base, Dulles and Ike had to pretend to be more hawkish than they actually were. A plus ca change moment.

Scoblete is getting at what I was getting at when I said non-interventionists need to challenge interventionism at its root, at the level of its assumptions. Rand’s speech and general strategy concedes too much.

For how many years has the US foolishly blocked progresss in the P5+1 negotiations with Iran, by refusing to accept Iranian enrichment to 5% or lower? Yesterday, in a front page story in The New York Times, US acceptance of such enrichment was acknowledged.

Stridency and demagoguery work when you are in a position of strength, but who would describe non-interventionism this way? Our foreign policy orthodoxy was born in the cold war, and whether for good or ill global interventionism made a lot more sense to the average person back then. Rand isn’t trying to change where we are, he’s trying to change the direction we go.

Remember, Ron Paul’s vaunted stridency on these questions bore no practical political fruit at all.

So despite a flood of pro-intervention propaganda in the major media, a round-the-clock pro-Israel disinformation machine, and Bizarro-World harangues from politicians like Graham, McCain, Rubio and Cruz, Americans aren’t buying it. Nor should they; our resources are needed here at home.

“Remember, Ron Paul’s vaunted stridency on these questions bore no practical political fruit at all.”

As I recall, Ron Paul was never none to be strident about anything. What he was and is is consistent and often impashioned, particularly about sound money, government constrained by the Constitution, and the withdrawal of American armed forces from foreign lands. The fruit it bore were immediately turned into seeds that have been planted around the country, while the fruit of the vine of Mitt Romney and company was seedless. Is anyone asking where Mitt’s “strident” supporters will turn in 2016? Romney’s support was a mile wide and an inch thick. When the election was over they didn’t care a wit what he has to say about anything we are debating today. Ron Paul’s supporters are comparing all other politicians, including his son, to the master every day. Unless you approach the Ron Paul “gold standard”, your hopes of gaining their support is nil, and their numbers are still growing every day.

At first blush, the 44% for less involvement in the Mid East is depressingly low. However, I suspect that many of the other 56% are pro Israeli Christians who could support somebody like Rand Paul. This is the reason for his trip to Israel and recent statements. When the evangelicals learn how the recent wars have harmed Christians, many see the wisdom of a less aggressive foreign policy.

“Ron Paul discovered that there was a ceiling for his support in the Republican primaries because he took a radical dissenting position against most consensus views on foreign policy.”

That may be true, but Ron Paul was also severely out of the Republican mainstream on a wide range of other issues too. One could argue that Ron Paul achieved the success he did largely on the basis of his foreign policy views, not in spite of them.

Which suggests to me that there could be room for an isolationist candidate pulling that Overton window his way, assuming he was orthodox on most other GOP issues.

One could argue that Ron Paul achieved the success he did largely on the basis of his foreign policy views, not in spite of them.

I’d say so as well. For many of his supporters, his welcome sanity on foreign policy was the most attractive thing about him, and caused many to overcome reservations about his other positions (this was especially true of his more liberal supporters).

If my wife’s Bible Belt, FOX-watching, conventional Republican relatives are any indication, Paul’s foreign policy views, while not popular, were hardly the only or necessarily the chief objectionable things about him. Rather, he was seen as a “weirdo” who wanted to legalize drugs and prostitution, dared to criticize other Republicans — not merely his opponents in the campaign, which is to be expected, but the Party’s past leaders — and droned on about abstrusities such as gold and the Fed, in addition to being someone who seemed soft on the Muslims (which is much less salient nowadays).